


holy is the sound

by carnival_papers



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Biblical References, Established Relationship, M/M, Oral Sex, Religion Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-12
Updated: 2015-08-12
Packaged: 2018-04-14 10:11:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4560648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carnival_papers/pseuds/carnival_papers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Javert lets out a bark of a laugh. “Sensual biblical love poetry! What a queer thing. You must read it.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	holy is the sound

**Author's Note:**

  * For [icicaille](https://archiveofourown.org/users/icicaille/gifts).



> I should have paid more attention in Sunday school.
> 
> Translation used is the King James Version. I was raised Protestant/Baptist, so please forgive any Catholic mistakes I may have made in this. Title from [this song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeBcfjH9PaY).

They have been working their way through the Bible, and Valjean has been dreading this night. In the months since Javert’s convalescence, they have spent long nights reading aloud—or, more accurately, Valjean has spent long nights reading aloud while Javert has pretended to listen. The reading is slow, but in the earliest days of Javert’s recovery, it filled many hours, and Valjean was happy to retell the Creation story, Moses and Abraham, even the genealogies, with their endless _begat_ s. Valjean has not read these stories aloud since Cosette was very small, and Javert has been a captive, if not entirely willing, audience.

But this strange thing has bloomed between them. In the winter, in the snowy garden behind the house, Javert had kissed him for the first time. They had read from 1 Samuel the evening before, about David and Jonathan, and Javert had actually appeared to be listening, for once. “The soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul,” Valjean had read, and Javert had made a soft noise at that. It had not seemed significant at the time, but the next night, they had stepped outside into the snow. Beneath the dark sky, while all of Paris was asleep, Javert had drawn Valjean close to him and kissed him with the desperation of a sinner crying out for God.

It did not feel wrong. It felt, in every sense of the word, divine.

And so it became almost simple, almost easy—between chapters, they have pressed kisses to one another’s mouths, for the second commandment is to love thy neighbor as thyself. After finishing Job, Valjean gave himself over to Javert, had allowed Javert to undress him with shaking hands and touch his battered body. He had touched Javert, too, his fingers trembling, thinking of the line from 1 John: “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear.” He was not sure, then, that this was love, but the kindness of Javert’s hands could not be called anything else.

That was a few months ago, and they have held hands as Valjean has read psalms, fallen asleep together after page upon page of proverbs. And just yesterday, Valjean had wept over Ecclesiastes for reasons he could not fully explain. Javert had eased the Bible from Valjean’s hands and set it on the table before taking Valjean into his arms and holding him, quiet, until the spell passed.

Tonight, though—Valjean sits at the foot of the bed as usual, the Bible closed on his lap, a finger between the pages where they left off the night before. He cannot bring himself to look in Javert’s eyes, and there is shame and nervousness heating in his chest. Javert sits next to him, staring, expectant.

“I have never seen you reluctant to start our reading,” Javert says, nudging Valjean with his shoulder. “Is something the matter?”

“Perhaps we ought to skip to Isaiah,” Valjean says. “The next book is not—it is a biblical anomaly.”

“You, skip an entire book? I sat through all of Leviticus, Valjean, surely this cannot be worse than that.” Javert reaches across Valjean’s lap to the Bible and opens it, despite Valjean’s protestations. “‘Song of Solomon’,” he reads. “What is this? What is the problem?”

Valjean sighs. He had hoped to avoid this. “It is, ah, poetry, of a sort. I have never studied it.”

“And yet you read all of the Psalms without hesitation. I do not understand you.” Javert huffs. He taps his foot on the hardwood floor—a sign that he will begin to stand and pace soon, as he had done during the drier passages of Numbers, despite the pain in his still-healing ribs.

“It is love poetry,” Valjean blurts out. He stammers as he speaks. “Quite, ah, sensual. Certainly not relevant to our—”

Javert lets out a bark of a laugh. “Sensual biblical love poetry! What a queer thing. You must read it.”

Valjean looks at him helplessly. “Javert, I—truly, it is quite alright if we do not read it.”

“Nonsense. You will read all of it. Come now, it’s getting late.” Javert jabs a finger at the top of the page, where the book begins.

Because this is the only time he has seen Javert excited about the Bible, Valjean takes a deep breath and begins to read. “The song of songs, which is Solomon’s,” he starts. Javert is close to him, reading over Valjean’s shoulder. “Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for thy love is better than wine.”

The beginning of the next verse is muffled against Javert’s lips. Javert kisses gently at the corner of Valjean’s mouth, and Valjean forgets how to speak. It still takes him by surprise when Javert kisses him like this. He has never done it during their reading before. It is not entirely unwelcome, but the kiss does nothing for Valjean’s anxiousness at reading this book. He has only ever skimmed these pages in passing—they seemed not meant for him, as physical love has never been meant for him. But Javert has changed that. He has changed so many things.

Valjean continues reading as Javert’s lips trail across his face, linger at his jaw. He distantly feels Javert’s fingertips at the small of his back, steady. “Draw me, we will run after thee: the king hath brought me into his chambers,” Valjean reads, Javert’s mouth soft against his skin. “We will be glad and rejoice in thee, we will remember thy love more than wine: the upright love thee.”

Javert rubs his fingers across Valjean’s lower back and his lips drift down to Valjean’s neck. He nuzzles his head against Valjean, breathing in deeply. Valjean reads on, focuses on each word, each verse, and the beauty of the language. The bed beneath them creaks as Javert moves carefully behind him. He kisses at the nape of Valjean’s neck, buries his face in Valjean’s hair.

Valjean hears his voice waver as he reads. “Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair; thou hast doves' eyes. Behold, thou art fair, my beloved, yea, pleasant: also our bed is green. The beams of our house are cedar, and our rafters of fir.” Once, in spring, in the middle of Proverbs, they had found each other in the garden. The grass was soft and warm and the yard smelled of lilies of the valley, and they had stripped one another of their clothes and come together there, slick with sweat and full of happiness, in their own Eden.

Perhaps it is a sin to think of such things while reading the Bible. He had never expected to, but Javert’s kisses are insistent, sweet, and Javert’s hands are at his shoulders. His shirt is thin; he can feel each touch even through the fabric. Valjean swallows hard, tries not to think about the heat welling up in his chest, emanating out from Javert’s hands and spreading across his entire body. It would be unforgivable to disgrace himself while reading the Word. He goes on: “As the apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons. I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste. He brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me was love.”

The first time, after they had finished Job, Javert had kissed him, still tasting like pears from that evening’s dinner. And now, each time they kiss, Valjean still half-expects him to taste of the forbidden fruit, the sweet giving way to bitter, smoothness giving way to sting. But the taste never burns him, and so Valjean has learned—is learning—how to take Javert as communion, each kiss as miraculous as manna from heaven.

Javert slips an arm around Valjean’s waist, over the tight muscle at his stomach. Valjean feels his palms shake, holding the Bible, and so he lowers the book to his lap and sets it on his thighs. He drops his head as if in prayer and reads more slowly. “My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away. For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone.”

There is a soft noise behind him, a quiet, small thing that he only hears because Javert’s mouth is close to his ear. It is hard not to apply some greater meaning to these passages, now that Valjean can finally relate them to himself and Javert. The months after the barricade and the river had been bleak and melancholy, blurring into the long, white winter. But the winter gave birth to this. It was borne out of that melancholy, all those long weeks spent fixing each other. 

“O my dove, that art in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of the stairs, let me see thy countenance, let me hear thy voice; for sweet is thy voice, and thy countenance is comely,” Valjean reads. It is strange how Javert still kisses him, beneath and behind his ear, his teeth gently pressing into his earlobe. Javert’s hands sweep up Valjean’s front, over his stomach and chest, finding the buttons of his shirt. His heart beats faster; Javert’s deft fingers begin to work at the buttons. Valjean takes a deep breath. “Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes,” he reads, and then pauses before moving on to the next verse.

He stills Javert’s hand over the buttons with his own, curling his fingers around Javert’s hand. Their hands, held together, make a fist over Valjean’s heart. “My beloved is mine, and I am his,” Valjean says, voice steady now. This, he is sure of.

Javert rests his head against Valjean’s shoulder, kisses there despite the shirt. It is a comfort Valjean had never wanted before, this touch, all this love. _My beloved_. They have never called each other that before. Indeed, they have never called this _love_. But in their reading, it is becoming more and more clear that there is no other word for this.

As Valjean continues to read, Javert moves again, somewhere behind Valjean. He slips his hand from Valjean’s and leaves the buttons as they are, a swath of Valjean’s skin visible. “By night on my bed I sought him whom my soul loveth: I sought him, but I found him not,” Valjean reads.

Abruptly, Javert lets out a laugh at that. Valjean glances to him. “Does that amuse you?” Valjean questions, more than a little confused.

Javert is getting to his feet again. “I do find it amusing that so little has changed over the millennia, yes,” he says, standing. “Surely you know how many nights I spent wishing for you.”

Valjean casts his eyes down at the Bible, his face suddenly flushing. “I am certain I do not.”

Then Javert is lifting his chin with a gentle hand, and he is meeting Javert’s eyes. “Innumerable,” Javert says. “Countless.”

He bends and kisses Valjean again, on the mouth this time, all tongue and teeth. There is still scripture on Valjean’s lips, in his throat. He kisses Javert back, not quite so forcefully, but places a hand to Javert’s cheek, brushes over his hair with calloused fingertips. There is the heat again. It warms him from the inside, makes him feel full of light, as he had the day an old bishop bought his soul for pieces of silver.

Javert pulls away and there is fire in his eyes, an old zealous hunger. “Should we be finished for the evening?” Valjean asks, ready to close the Bible. Javert’s kiss was insistent, he has felt it this way before—when Javert wants to be laid down and taken, this is how he shows it. Valjean is happy to give this to him, if he desires it.

But, oddly, Javert says, “No, please continue.”

Valjean looks up at Javert, and Javert only nods, so he clears his throat and reads again. “I will rise now, and go about the city in the streets, and in the broad ways I will seek him whom my soul loveth: I sought him, but I found him not.” Valjean is vaguely aware of Javert somewhere in front of him, perhaps watching him. Occasionally, he has caught Javert looking at him, either while working in the garden or preparing dinner or here, reading in the bed they have come to share. He resembles a disciple in a Renaissance painting, looking upon the Savior in disbelief and devotion. Such looks had made him uncomfortable, once, and they are still new to him, but he has come to accept them. Valjean, too, has found himself staring at Javert similarly, as he idly turns through pages of the newspaper. Such a thing—looking—could not be wrong, not if God has allowed it, not if Javert looks at him in kind.

He continues reading, and there is the soft thump of something hitting the floor. Valjean glances up from the Bible, mid-sentence, to see Javert on his knees before him, hands pressed together as if in prayer. His face is roughly even with Valjean’s knees. The Bible still rests on Valjean’s thighs, in his lap.

“Do not stop reading,” Javert insists, inching closer to Valjean. He taps on the Bible with an index finger. “Lift this up, though, please.”

Valjean feels his mouth hanging open, but he does as commanded and holds the Bible between his palms. With Javert at his feet, he thinks of Mary—Mary, who wept and washed Jesus’ feet with her tears, anointed his feet with oil, dried them with her hair. Once, Javert had fallen to his knees and begged forgiveness, weeping and resting his head against Valjean’s leg. Now, Javert eases Valjean’s legs apart with an open palm, and Valjean lets himself be moved, his legs positioned where Javert wants them.

After a deep breath, he reads again. “Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee.”

Valjean had forgiven him, though he has never felt forgiveness his to bestow. Javert had kissed his feet, ugly and tough and old as they are, and thanked him endlessly. That night, they had shared the bed for the first time. It was chaste, then, but they had clung to each other as the disciples must have clung to each other during the storm at Galilee, before Christ had intervened. It was the night they began to read Judges, Valjean is sure of that.

As he reads, Valjean feels Javert’s hands at his legs, tracing up his calves and feeling his muscles. Valjean is shamefully aware of the hardness pressing against the front of his trousers now. He can ignore it no longer. “Thou hast—” Valjean’s breath catches, Javert’s palms slipping up his thighs. He cannot bear to look down at Javert and see the way he kisses the inside of Valjean’s knee. “Thou hast ravished my heart,” he reads, once he has steadied himself again. Javert’s hands travel up Valjean’s thighs to his waistline, fingers tugging at the waistband of his trousers. Javert yanks them down a little and the pale skin of Valjean’s stomach is suddenly slightly exposed. He tries to read more as Javert works at the trousers, kissing and nosing at Valjean’s knee and thigh all the while.

Javert gets the flap of Valjean’s trousers undone quickly, his stiff prick finally unbound. Javert’s fingers glance over this new skin as Valjean reads about orchards of pomegranates and trees of frankincense. He cannot keep his breath steady any longer, especially not as Javert tugs the trousers down over Valjean’s thighs. Valjean lifts up, just slightly, to make the task easier for Javert, and then the trousers are pooled around his ankles, and his legs are bare.

Valjean’s voice wavers as he finishes the chapter. “Awake, O north wind; and come, thou south,” he breathes, “blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out. Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat his pleasant fruits.”

The first time they had touched, bare to each other in the lamplight on the bed, Javert had pleaded with Valjean to turn over, and so Valjean had, his back exposed in the light and the chill, powerless under Javert’s hands. Like Thomas Didymus—the skeptic, full of doubt—Javert had touched his fingers to Valjean’s old scars, followed them with his hands. He had whispered, “My God,” so soft Valjean could barely hear it, and then pressed his lips to the center of Valjean’s back, where the scars are thickest.

Then, his touch had been tentative, unsure. Now it is more brave, proud and reckless, and Valjean feels Javert’s shoulders between his thighs. There is the warmth of Javert’s breath in his softest places, and it no longer unsettles him that Javert can want him so. He cannot, will not, deny Javert the opportunity to find God in whatever way suits him.

Javert takes Valjean’s prick into his hand and holds him steady before licking a long line down the ridge. Valjean is reading, “I rose up to open to my beloved; and my hands dropped with myrrh,” and he somehow, blessedly, manages not to choke on any of the words. Valjean pushes his legs against Javert’s shoulders, feels the bone dig into the muscle of his thighs. It is a terrible temptation to put the Bible down and twist his fingers into Javert’s hair, guide his speed and his angle. But Javert has insisted he read, so he does. “Perfect love casteth out fear,” he remembers again, and tells himself not to be afraid.

Valjean’s palms shake and his chest heaves as Javert works between his legs. He is not sure he will be able to hold the Bible until Javert is done, or if he will be able to finish reading the book. They have three chapters yet to go. He reads, “My beloved is white and ruddy, the chiefest among ten thousand. His head is as the most fine gold, his locks are bushy, and black as a raven.” For now, at least, he can breathe. The Bible trembles in his hands, and he feels the strange juxtaposition of God in him and Javert around him. They are two different kinds of joy, and as he reads, they bleed into each other, becoming indiscernible.

Javert’s lips close around the head of his prick, wet and warm, and Valjean stumbles over the next verse. “His—his mouth is most sweet,” Valjean murmurs, stifling the moan that rises in his throat. “Yea, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend.”

Before turning the page, he glances down to Javert. The strands of gray in his hair shine in this light, bright as silver, and everything else is pale skin and the freckles on his shoulders and back. He wants to rest his fingers against Javert’s neck, touch the soft skin behind his ear, but he cannot. It is torturous, this teasing, and probably blasphemous, too.

Still, Valjean is sure there must be something holy about it. What they have shared has always felt blessed, hallowed and primal, as Eden before the fall. Occasionally, Javert has watched him pray, first from a distance, across the room, then, kneeling next to him. Early on, while Javert was still recovering, Valjean had prayed for him, aloud, and Javert had scoffed. But the night Javert had asked forgiveness, Valjean had prayed for him again, lowered himself to the ground with Javert and clasped his hands and asked God to forgive him.

He has told Javert of salvation, and each time, Javert has refused it, saying, “I have been saved.”

Javert lifts his head from Valjean’s prick and kisses the smooth skin at Valjean’s stomach, draws a finger across his inner thighs. “Read on,” he insists, when Valjean does not turn the page immediately. He sucks at the inside of Valjean’s thigh, the coarse hair at his cheeks rubbing across Valjean’s skin.

Valjean wants to speak, but does not know what he would say if he could form words. His breath hitches as reads the scripture instead. “Whither is thy beloved gone,” he reads, Javert’s thumb stroking softly at the base of his prick. “Whither is thy beloved turned aside?”

He is immobilized by Javert’s hands, one at his prick, the other set at his hip, where his fingers reach underneath the hem of his shirt to smooth across his lower back. Valjean’s skin bristles. He attempts to slow his breathing, to remain calm even as Javert draws the tip of his fingernail down Valjean’s prick. “My beloved is gone down into his garden, to the beds of spices,” he murmurs, the words losing clarity, “to feed in the gardens, and to gather lilies.”

Javert takes Valjean into his mouth again, more fully this time, and Valjean is certain he will drop the Bible. His body moves of its own accord, back arching as if possessed by something greater than himself. “I am my beloved’s,” he reads, as Javert works in long, deep pulls. “And my beloved is—“

The last word turns into a moan before Valjean can form it. He closes his eyes, holds the Bible in one hand and steadies himself on the bed with the other. His fingers dig into the sheets. Javert does not relent.

“And my beloved is mine,” Valjean spills the words in one long stream, gasping for breath once he has read the verse. Javert’s hair tickles against his stomach and everything is sensation, God and the Word and Javert, all separate and somehow all together. “Thou art—beautiful,” his breath catches, “O— _oh_ —my love.”

He can hardly keep still. From this position, it is hard to roll his hips against Javert, to thrust shallowly into his mouth and feel Javert’s tongue against him. He feels storm-tossed, moved, and Javert and the Bible are the only things he has to hold onto. He focuses on the words. He speaks more slowly now, each word drawn out and wavering on his tongue. “I went down into the garden of nuts to see the fruits of the valley, and to see whether the vine flourished and the pomegranates budded.”

Javert’s teeth scrape against him, clumsy. The pressure is replaced with his lips again, soft and slow, and Valjean’s muscles tense. It is more difficult to read now; his mind and eyes are clouded, and he feels as though he is swimming or drowning or falling. “How fair and pleasant art thou,” he sighs, hand searching for Javert’s shoulder, “O love— _God_ —O love, for delights.”

He reads on, each word more difficult than the one before. “And the roof of thy mouth like the best wine for my—my beloved, that goeth down sweetly, causing the lips of those that are asleep to speak.” Valjean hangs on that word, _beloved_ , and it comes out in the same reverent tone he uses to speak of the Savior. He moans, a noise like a lamentation, like Christ crying out for God. This is, at once, sin and confession and salvation.

Panting, he starts the next verse. “I am my beloved's, and his desire is—is—”

He is a burning bush, he is water flowing from rocks, he is the Red Sea parting.

The Bible falls from his hand as he spends, landing on the floor with a thump. Valjean grabs for Javert’s shoulders, his body bending, head dropping. He cannot breathe, cannot speak, only murmur for God or Javert—he is not sure, here, now, that there is a difference. This is a kind of communion, a resurrection. Nothing short of a miracle.

Javert swallows around him, does not let go of his hip. Valjean feels himself empty, all his suffering ended, all his worries lightened. He is hot, aware of sweat pooling at his neck and lower back, and he is so, so tired. When Javert lifts his head away, it takes whatever reserves of strength Valjean has left not to collapse backward onto the bed. Instead, he tangles his fingers in Javert’s hair, brushes his knuckles against Javert’s face. Javert is smiling beatifically, pleased, and Valjean still cannot catch his breath.

“Is that all? That seems an odd place to stop.” The look on his face is self-satisfied. At this moment, Valjean cannot remember if pride is a sin. If it is, Javert is certainly guilty of it. But Valjean pulls him up and kisses him softly, the salt taste of sweat and spend still on his lips.

“There is another chapter still,” Valjean says between kisses, still breathless. “But I cannot read any more tonight.”

“Perhaps tomorrow, you might let me read some,” Javert says. He kisses at Valjean’s neck, mumbling the word _beloved_ into Valjean’s skin.

“Yes,” Valjean promises. “Yes, my beloved.” It is strange to say that to Javert of his own volition, not as a vocalization of God’s word. But this is holy, Valjean is certain, and they are redeemed, and—there is no question of it now—he is blessed.


End file.
